Why preparing for conversations backfires, my dad's birthday, a new theme: Maturity!
Fruits of my first week of NaNoBloMo 2019
Hello and happy fall! Finally a bit brisk here in NYC.
I decided to do a big writing marathon this month. The fruits of the first week are in:
Series on My First 6 Months in Business
This series is now complete! Here are all the parts:
Notes from 6 Months of Being In Business - summary so far
A Look At My Philosophical Life Coaching Clients - who the hell hires a philosopher?
On “Helping People” - I didn’t get into coaching to “help people,” but something changed
The More I Prepare for a Session, the Worse I Do
This is easily the most surprising thing I’ve learned about coaching so far: I need to quash the urge to over-prepare for sessions just because I’m a bit nervous.
More than 5 minutes worth of preparation for a session isn’t just useless, it’s actively pernicious.
Why? Because preparing for a coaching conversation makes active listening much more difficult, because I feel invested in saying my piece.
I think there’s probably a takeaway for all hard or important conversations in here. It’s one thing to know what you want to talk about. But conversation takes two, and the people you speak with want you to engage what they say as fully as possible.
Check it out: The More I Prepare for a Session, the Worse I Do
On A Personal Note
This week got off to a garbage start, though, because my dad’s first missed birthday was Sunday, November 3rd.
I wrote about my experience of dad’s last birthday alive here: Learn to Love It All.
Also I got a new tattoo. It didn’t hurt much.
New Theme: Maturity
Back in May, I was exposed to the idea of creating a “personal knowledge monopoly” via an online writing course (shoutout to my Write of Passage classmates on this list).
Of course, I write about philosophy, life coaching, and philosophical life coaching.
But I’ve struggled for months to define what the other thing could be. And it finally came to me.
I am a scholar and practitioner of the struggle around maturity.
More here: Growing Up Is Hard To Do
What does “maturity” mean to you?
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